At Calvin Klein, Dressing for Dystopia -

It’s a tough gig to be crowned the savior of American fashion. Excessive expectations and all that. Most designers would quail at the thought.

Raf Simons, however, is not one of those people. He has not only accepted the mantle, he has tossed it over his shoulders and added a stringy, Sterling Ruby-inspired fringe. . . .

“It’s about American horror and American beauty,” he said in his show notes; the dream turned nightmare. The immediate interpretation of that one is easy — let no one say Mr. Simons, who is Belgian, shies away from current events — though the designer chose to approach his subject at a more oblique angle, through the American fantasy factory that is Hollywood. Because, like the movies, “Calvin Klein is an American institution.”